12Be assured! The days are coming—oracle of the LORD—when I will send him wine-makers to decant the wine; they shall empty its flasks and smash its jars.
13Chemosh shall disappoint Moab, just as the house of Israel was disappointed by Bethel, in which they trusted.d

21Judgment has come upon the plateau: on Holon, Jahzah, and Mephaath,h22on Dibon, Nebo, and Beth-diblathaim,
23on Kiriathaim, Beth-gamul, and Beth-meon,
24on Kerioth and on Bozrah: on all the cities of the land of Moab, far and near.

25The horn of Moab is cut off,

its arm is broken—oracle of the LORD.

26Make him drunk because he set himself over against the LORD; let Moab swim in his vomit and become a laughingstock.
27Has Israel not been a laughingstock to you? Was he caught among thieves that you wag your heads whenever you speak of him?i

34The cry of Heshbon and Elealeh is heard as far as Jahaz; they call from Zoar to Horonaim and to Eglath-shelishiyah; even the waters of Nimrim turn into a wasteland.m35I will leave no one in Moab—oracle of the LORD—to offer burnt offerings on the high place or to make sacrifices to their gods.
36Hence my heart wails like a flute for Moab; my heart wails like a flute for the people of Kir-heres: the wealth they accumulated has perished.n37Every head has been shaved bald, every beard cut off; every hand gashed, and all their loins are draped in sackcloth.o38On all the rooftops of Moab and in all its squares there is mourning. I have shattered Moab like a pot that no one wants—oracle of the LORD.
39How terrified they are, how they wail! How Moab turns its back in shame! Moab has become a laughingstock and a horror to all its neighbors!

* [48:1–47] Moab, located east of the Dead Sea, was one of Israel’s bitter enemies (cf., e.g., Is 15–16; Am 2:1–3). According to Flavius Josephus, Nebuchadnezzar conquered Moab and Ammon in his twenty-third year (582 B.C.), five years after the destruction of Jerusalem. This chapter is full of local place names in Moab.

* [48:2] Madmen: a place name, not mentioned elsewhere in the Old Testament.

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